The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1887-02-05

CLOAK coming along the road as II 1t
were round somebody, but nobody in
side it, it would be awful. But if you
spied inside the cloak, and making it |
come toward you, the most beautiful |
loving face you ever saw-of man car
rying in his arms little child-and
saw the child clinging to him, and look
ing in his face with a blessed smile,
you would not be frightened at the
black cloak" And this is the real pur-
port of death it enwraps an ever fresh,
young and blessed life. 1t is rejuvenes-
cence. See how amply this is verified
by the most familiar facts. We break
open the sepulchres of creation and
bring forth the gifts that death has
stored there we take the black masses
of latent light, and heat, to warm our
bodies, to illuminate our dwellings, to
propel our engines, to drive the ma
chinery that weaves our clothing, to
bear us over the earth with the speed of
an enchanted horse, to give to our ships
wings of fire and enable them to wres-
tie triumphantly with the wrath of
tempests and stem the force of the cur
rents of the mighty deep; we cannot
inventory or estimate the comforts, the
felicity, still less the rapid and wide
spread progress of the world which have
found their quickening progress in the
unfathomable mines of coal, which
death has stored up for our use. 1t will
bring no sombre shadow upon the
princely returns of the Standard Com
pany, nor upon the luxurious estates of
the myriads who have profited by this
new-found source of wealth to be told
that in striking oil' they but strike
into the long quiet grave of forms of
organic life which ceased to palpitate
before human history began; or lessen
the value of the snowy marble which is
wrought into such varied uses-adorn-
ing His mansions-andr reared into pala-
tial structures for the living and max
ing their last resting place when dead,
that it is but metamorphosis of shells
of the ocean-not showing themselves in
black, but in spotless purity. And in
a still larger ministry the ceaseless work
of decay and death has covered the
earth with it's cultivable mold, made it
fertile, so that we find life, sweet, ex-
uberant life, growing everywhere more
vigorous, and widely extended in the
natural world because of the ministra-
ton Of death. 1t does not occur to us
when we gather the viOlets and May
flowers, the fragrant earnests that the
gentle spring has come again, and is at
work clothing the earth with beauty,
light and love, that the green and shady
bed in which they are rooted is death
bed and in the autumnal season when
the harvest is passed, the acres of wav-
ing corn and wheat which appeared in
the days of summer glory,
"As if the yawning earth to heaven
subterranean host had given;''
disappearing as quietly as they came
their work finished, their whole being
conferred in giving to us our daily bread,
but made possible only by the prelim-
mary ministration of death. And SO we
have once more seen all nature yielding
up its life, not clothed in habiliments of
woe, not arrayed in sombre hues, but
gloriously, in gold, in crimson and pur-
pie, in regal pomp and splendor-it has
confronted the inevitable hour, but ex-
employing the fact that
Life evermore is fed by death,
In earth and sea and sky;
| And that a rose may breathe its breath,
Something must die.
earth is a sepulchre of flowers,
Whose vitalizing mould
Through boundess transmutation towers,
In green and gold.
From hand to hand, life's cup is passed
Up beings piled graduation
Till men to angels yield at last,
The rich collation."
LII q oCAAoO oloOi SAO I1lC VI luc
world has been fed and enlarged by the
sufferings and death of legions of man
kind. Liberties, privileges and count
less springs of happiness are ours, which
have cost anguish of spirit and unutter-
able sacrifices on the part of generations
gone before; for these, the crown of
thorns has been worn and Calvary's
steep climbed, for these men have been
tortured, not accepting deliverance, the
block has soaked their gore, their heads
have soddened in the sun, their limbs
been strung from city gates and castle
walls, that they might augment the
deep and sweeping thoughts that con-
duct the world to freedom, and to God.
Theirs was the cross and the grave;
ours the crown and the prize; they
gave their lives for the life of the world,
and in them the word is fulfilled, SEX
cept corn of wheat fall into the ground
and die it abideth alone, but if it die, it
bringeth forth much fruit" Herein
the ministration of death has glorified
the world, it has hallowed the ground
where heroes sleep, made their names
illustrious and the present age infinitely